If you already enjoy the best outdoor activities Staffordshire has to offer, then you may already know that having a buddy helps encourage you to take part in physical activity.
Now a study has determined what we knew all along; people with a partner for their physical activities do more, than those without one.
A recent study showed that families who used a fitness tracker with a gamifying aspect to it, achieved their daily fitness goal a whopping 27 per cent of the time more often than those who did not.
The study by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Boston University School of Medicine, showed that families in these groups achieved individual daily step counts of more than a mile more than people without them.
“Our social connections – family members, friends, and even colleagues – can be powerful motivators, but most programs target individuals instead of leveraging these social networks,” said lead author Mitesh Patel, MD, MBA, MS, an assistant professor of Medicine and Health Care Management, and director of Penn Medicine’s Nudge Unit.
Ninety-four families were included in the study, which covered a 12-week period. These people were giving tracking apps which included gamification in their targets, which was also shown to have a positive benefit on the levels of activity the participants achieved.
The study was one of the first to look at how digital health interventions can help improve activity levels overall.